How Keri Stroebel Stepped Out Of Her Comfort Zone To Change Her Life

With no pageanting experience, Keri Stroebel entered Mrs South Africa in 2016 to do something different and combat her post-partum depression. The experience changed her life, giving her the direction she’d been looking for.

With no pageanting experience, Keri Stroebel entered Mrs South Africa in 2016 to do something different and combat her post-partum depression. The experience changed her life, giving her the direction she’d been looking for.

I’d never believed I had the potential to be an entrepreneur.

The thought of running my own business terrified me. But that’s where I’ve ended up because I’ve found something I’m passionate about, and where I can add value. My goals have changed, and I have this incredible drive linked to my purpose. It’s been a revelation.

Today I’m the chairman of the South African Council for Business Women in Cape Town.

I’ve spent the last 18 months networking and building up my branches. It hasn’t been easy. But I’ve discovered that if you find something you really care about, you can make it happen. You need connections and to surround yourself with like-minded people, and the only person who can make that happen is you.

Princess Bootcamp has been my answer to helping girls who are like me.

I suffered from depression my entire life and never knew it. When I matriculated I didn’t know what I wanted to do. This was the story of my life, and resulted in a lot of job hopping, which took an additional toll on my self-confidence.

Before I gave birth to my son, I didn’t realise I’d been dealing with depression my entire life.

I thought it was hormones, or stress. It was only once I was diagnosed with post-partum depression that I realised this was something I’d always battled with, and it had affected the progression of my life.

I entered Mrs South Africa because I wanted to do something completely different and outside of my comfort zone.

I wasn’t thinking about launching a business to help young girls at that stage — I was still trying to find my own meaning and purpose, step by step. I ended up being a semi-finalist, which was totally unexpected, since I’m short and curvy, and suddenly things started coming together for me.

These new experiences helped me find my purpose.

At the same time as I’d achieved a level of self-awareness about my own life and its new direction, I was given a platform to speak to teenage girls about depression. I started speaking at schools, and the more girls I spoke to, the more I realised how prevalent this feeling of “I’m not good enough” is.

I didn’t have a strong female role model growing up and I looked to celebrities.

Some celebrities use the platform to share powerful messages, others behave badly. It’s confusing for young girls. I also realised that school wasn’t giving them a safe space to explore the issues they were facing, and so I launched The Princess Bootcamp.

I felt like I’d woken up. For the first time in my life I was doing something I was passionate about.

It’s amazing what a difference that makes. I spent my life looking for the right fit — sales, PR, digital marketing, travel — I’ve tried it all. And then I found that if I shared my experiences with other young girls and women, I could help them.

Now instead of trying to find something I care about, I’m trying to figure out how to make something I care about work.

It’s scary and incredibly rewarding. I realised almost immediately that, as a business, this needed to be sustainable. We launched with incredible partners who helped with the talks, and Essence Cosmetics, who gave free goodie bags to girls attending the full-day Saturday bootcamp. Parents pay R550 for R6 000 worth of value.

The goal is to make the day as accessible as possible, and eventually offer it for free to girls in need who cannot afford to pay.

Our biggest challenge has been how to pay the message forward, after the bootcamp wraps up. We’ve created workbooks and open lines of communication, but making a real impact in the lives of teenage girls takes more than just one intervention.

We’re arming them with information, insight and tools to cope with challenges they encounter

But the change needs to be permanent, and that’s what I’m focusing on now — that, and growing the business nationally.

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Designing Her Destiny

In 2011, Emmerentia van den Hoven took a leap of faith when she decided to leave her graphic design job at an agency and pursue her real passion – and it has paid off tenfold. Here’s her story.

“When I started planning my own wedding eight years ago, I fell in love with wedding design and wanted to do that for the rest of my life. Designing for brands had become a set of rules rather than being creative, and I’d always wanted to work for myself. So, in September 2011, I turned my seven-month-old side gig into a fully-fledged business and launched Oh Yay!

I have to hustle every month to get new clients because every client will use my services maximum twice – first for the wedding invitations and then for the stationery on the day – so I don’t normally have returning clients.

Because my main business is seasonal and usually once-off per customer, I have branched out into branding for small businesses in the beauty and lifestyle industry. I also earn a passive income through the Oh Yay! online shop where I sell wedding décor items. Oh Yay Kids – my other online store – is my passion project. I launched it just before my second child was born, adding items to the store that I made for my two boys when I saw a need for it. I then expanded into prints for nurseries and kids’ party stationery.

I work for myself and have no employees, so the fact that QuickBooks lets me load all my services, products and prices in one place makes running my business so much easier. Being an entrepreneur is difficult because you don’t know if you’ll be successful or not. But if you believe in and love what you’re doing, it reflects in your work and the service you give.”

Less admin, more of what you love

When Oh Yay! was launched, along with her dream of being an entrepreneur, came the nightmare of other administrative tasks. But that changed in 2018 when Emmerentia started using QuickBooks.

“When I was using spreadsheets to balance my books, I was spending 80% of my time on admin, which left very little time to tend to customers’ orders. I now spend no more than 25% of my time on admin, which is important, especially when it comes to the speed at which I send quotes. You don’t get any work if you don’t send out quotes and it’s tough to juggle the admin with your actual job of running the business.

Numbers were never really my strong point, so having a professional quote done in record time not only projects professionalism, but the format also changes the way new clients see me. In my industry, the quicker you can send a quote out, the likelier you’ll get the clients’ business. It gives legitimacy to my business. The QuickBooks system operates so seamlessly that clients communicate with me differently, like I have my own accounting department, when in fact, I’m a one-woman-show.

I used to dread doing admin, but now it’s so easy and quick. I’m not just saying this – QuickBooks changed my life.”

Starting a business is not for the faint of heart, but that didn’t stop these 50 women from doing it. Across the continent, women have pursued entrepreneurship, some for the very first time at 50 years old, while others have never even been formally employed.

Owner Of Nouwens Carpets Shares Success Lessons From Running A 50 Year Old Family Business

A company that’s been active for more than five decades in an industry that’s hundreds of years old doesn’t sound like a recipe for innovation — and yet that’s exactly what Luci Nouwens, owner of Nouwens Carpets, is focused on.

The modern carpet has a history that goes back thousands of years. And despite the hipster trend of reclaimed and hard wood flooring, the carpet still remains a popular choice for consumers.

In South Africa, a name that’s synonymous with quality carpeting is Nouwens. When Cornelis Nouwens arrived in the country in the 1950s, bringing the skills of a trade which he had mastered alongside his father in Tilburg, the hub of the Netherlands’ wool textile industry, he passed on the skills and the love of the craft to his family and to workers in the Harrismith region in KwaZulu Natal.

More than 50 years after her father started it in 1962, the company remains family owned, and is headed by Luci Nouwens, who has been with the business for 48 years.

“We have maintained our reputation for premium quality all this time by paying meticulous attention to crafting standards and selecting only the finest raw materials,” says Luci. “Equally important is that we have innovated at every opportunity, embracing technology without ever compromising the traditional craftsman’s spirit.”

Innovation drives growth

Businesses that innovate are able to grow and hire more employees. As a result, they grab a bigger share of the market. That’s true regardless of the size of your business: If you innovate, you can scale up.

In 1968 Nouwens launched a pure karakul wool carpet that was extremely hard wearing and took the company into the commercial carpet market. Luci recalls the manufacturing of the carpet as “a major feat of unique textile engineering.” Another innovation in 2005 was the introduction of a totally new style of flat weave wool carpet, a very clean, minimalist and natural look requiring much less wool without compromising on wearability.

“These innovations are just two of many that have allowed the business to boost its market share over the years,” says Luci. “But beyond that, innovation has enabled Nouwens Carpets to form the backbone of economic activity and upliftment in the local community around Harrismith. This has allowed us to make substantial investment in providing education and skills development for the local population, to ensure that the craft is preserved for generations to come.”

Innovation enables sustainability

Innovation in technologies and how they are applied is key to enabling a manufacturer like Nouwens to create new business value, while also protecting the planet.

“We have used technology to enable sustainable manufacturing, for the benefit of the business, the community, and our customers.”

Nouwens selects equipment, materials and manufacturing methods based on their degree of sustainability and protection of the environment. The company is also a member of the Green Building Council of South Africa and submits its products for VOC testing to ensure that harmful emissions are significantly reduced.

“Ultimately, we are driven by a passion for textiles and the ability to constantly find better ways to produce beautiful products. After the downturn in the economy, we started to produce more cost-effective commercial nylon yarns, and in 2017, we became the new kid on the block for synthetic grass. The bottom line is that a true entrepreneur does what has to be done when the time comes.” — Monique Verduyn

The role of disruption in creating value

A disruptive business is a business that challenges and potentially changes the status quo. From a mindset point of view, a culture that questions ‘why’ can help foster organisational and market disruption. But disruption for the sake of disruption is self-defeating, it needs to be on the back of making things better and based on commercial principles, i.e. people or market players actually wanting to be disrupted.

The starting point is this: Does someone, or a market, value what you’re producing? If the answer is yes, you have a commercially viable disruption. Disruption that is valued by its target market has the best chance of resulting in success.

Get that right and you’ll have a customer base, you’ll gain traction and you’ll attract investors, provided you’re also making a meaningful and sustainable difference to your target market or community. — Ian Lessem, CEO, HAVAIC Investment and Advisory Firm

Collaboration

Team up with customers and competitors.

There’s more power in collaboration than competition. We’re stronger together than when we’re apart. When it comes to working with competitors, consider this: They may have something that you don’t, or vice versa, and 50% of something is always more than 100% of nothing. You’re then positioned to add value before you add an invoice, so your clients benefit from your relationships, and the market wins. From there, you become your client’s go-to-person, because you’re putting them first.

Customers are also a great source of knowledge: They might just have the answers you’re looking for, but are you asking them the right questions? They often know more about an entrepreneur’s business than they know themselves, because they’re on the receiving end of your offering. One way to collaborate with customers is to ask them more questions about yourselves, themselves and their clients. Harness their perspective and develop yourself to give them what they want, not what you think they want. — Wes Boshoff, founder, Imagine Thinking

PR

Know what your audiences are interested in

As a brand, there are many ways to ensure your audience is paying attention to you, but you can’t expect them to find you unless you’re sharing content that captures their interest. If you send out press releases, don’t be too rigid or plain. Audiences want to be engaged, and not to have to deal with long, cumbersome information. An infographic, along with a video or pictures will make your release easier to ingest and more memorable. People don’t want boring figures, they want relatable stories.

One way to be relatable is by tapping into influencer marketing. This doesn’t mean you need celebrities with the highest followings to endorse you. Micro-influencers are proving to have just as much clout as those with larger followings. Evidence shows that micro-influencers have a more established and deeper connection with their audience, which translates to loyalty and a readiness to follow their advice. The trick is to find the micro-influencers who are speaking to the audience you want to reach.

Big data plays a key role in painting a picture of who is ‘out there’. With the right information, you can tailor your content to a specific audience. Big data can show you what topics and problems are trending in your industry, so that you can get the jump on them. Use big data to deliver your own insights on current topics, shaping and leading the conversation, converting your audience’s attention into action. — Madelain Roscher, founder and managing director, PR Worx and Status Reputation Management